A/N: So I decided to change the rating of this story because of graphic violence. Hahaha, I didn't even realize that I was going in that direction. By the way, someone told me that 4 yr olds can speak properly unless a child has a speech impediment. However, I made a four-yr old Naruto speak improperly. I honestly didn't know if that was right because I grew up with a brother who is 2 years younger than me, and he definitely had difficulty speaking even at the age of 8, so I really didn't have any basis. So I want to have your honest opinion, should I change what I did to Naruto in Chapter 2, or should I just continue? Comment your opinions.

THE SET UP OF THIS STORY IS SHIFTING FROM PRESENT, PAST, PRESENT TO UNDERSTAND HOW THINGS HAPPENED AND RESULTED TO THE CURRENT SITUATION AT HAND. THERE ARE A LOT OF QUESTIONS UNANSWERED BUT IT WILL BE REVEALED SOON.

Before going to the chapter, of course, I want to thank my awesome betas! Without them, this story would be a pile of junks.

o0CrimsonsDragon0o

Kuroi raion

NeatStuff

Nedoko-maki

hakon2feb

13talos

ProngIsABadger

Ladybirdwrites

Go18

SarcasmRocks

(EDITED 12/21/2021)

The Fourth Hokage's Son

Chapter Three

THE PAST FOUR YEARS BEFORE THE PRESENT TIME

Kushina Uzumaki-Namikaze had always been a lucky person. She had bragged about this a couple of times to her close friend, the Uchiha matriarch, and the Slug Princess back in the day, and even her fiancé, Minato Namikaze was often exasperated with her luck.

One time, Tsunade had brought her to the casino to gamble together.

After teasing and cackling at the legendary sucker each time she lost, which coincidentally was all the time, the woman got so fed up with her that she challenged Kushina to a game, and the loser had to do the bidding of the winner for a month straight. To the utter disbelief of the Slug Sannin, she won every single game without fail. She didn't even know that Tsunade had rigged it in her own favor.

Since then, the temperamental sannin had the habit of dragging Kushina with her every time she went to the casino to gamble. Of course, this quickly became boring her and so she decided to have fun teasing and ordering Tsunade around before agreeing, much to the never-ending ire of her blond friend.

Kushina got everything she wanted either by hook or by crook and with all the years she spent with good fortune on her sleeves, she had never once thought that her luck would finally run out and leave her to tumble headfirst into the bottomless rabbit hole.

So, when karma finally came to bite her in the ass, it came with vengeance.

It was sometime in early summer when an unexpected situation had pushed her to pester Minato to send her on a simple solo mission before she retired. They were planning to have a child sometime soon this year, and she knew that she would be stuck at home for years until their future child was big enough to handle themselves when Kushina went on a mission or when Minato was out doing his duty. That time, she was determined to go no matter what — to prove something to herself. If only she knew...

Everything went well that day; the mission was a walk in the park for Kushina and she even had two pieces of cake for her and Minato to enjoy once she made it back to their warm cozy apartment. She never imagined that things would go so far out of control the moment she stepped out of the little town and began her long walk all the way back to Konoha.

All good shinobis were the ones that survived, and if they survived then they must be either lucky or exceptionally good at their job. Kushina was one that fit the latter category, she would say though, that the truth of the matter was that one could be lucky to an extent. Those who refused to die were those who were skilled enough to have such ambition.

The weather had been nice, a few clouds dotting the vast blue sky. The color reminded her of Minato's similar deep soulful eyes, the passing thought comforted her a bit. She looked down the well-worn path she had walked and noticed something was off.

It was quiet.

Far too quiet to be considered normal; the birds weren't singing, the cicadas were not chirping, and nature itself seemed to have gone silent. Suddenly, the sunshine did not feel so warm anymore.

It was a rather unexpected thing to happen to Kushina; it was out of the norm for her to be taken by surprise having this much forewarning. One moment she was alone on the road, the next moment she wasn't. Five maroon-clad Iwa shinobi had risen from the ground like a walking corpse and proceeded to block her way. All five of them grabbed a kunai from their holster while moving into their preferred battle stance in front of the famed kunoichi.

Now if this had been a normal fight, these five would be nothing compared to the Red Hot-Blooded Habanero. After all, Kushina was an S-Rank Kunoichi, one of the best there ever was in Konoha. But as the fight started, fate was against her that day and the unexpected happened.

For a second, Kushina looked like she was winning, incapacitating two of her opponents in quick succession. Everything was going smoothly as always. Alas, this was when her lucky star had chosen to abandon her. As she was busy fighting the remaining Iwa Shinobi, a cold feeling brushed her spine as if someone had trod upon a deceased one's grave.

it was a warning, a bright red flag raised by her battle instincts.

Looking back, maybe Kushina had become too cocky, knowing for certain she could defeat any enemy she was faced with. But when mists started surrounding her and she felt her body getting drowsy, she realized she had made a colossal mistake. She didn't even have the chance to grab Minato's special kunai when something pricked the back of her neck, and before she knew it, she lost consciousness. The sight of ten smirking Iwa shinobi was the last thing she saw before the darkness devoured her.

When Kushina opened her eyes again, she was bound by chains, wrapped tightly around her wrists as she knelt on the cold ground. Her arms were suspended upwards with chains and in front of her stood the Kage of the Hidden Stone Village: The Tsuchikage, Onoki, one of Minato's sworn enemies.

"O-Onoki!" Kushina growled though the word came out quieter than intended as her throat was parched and her body felt abnormally weak. Drugs, no doubt, used to dull and suppress her body's natural functions.

"Ah, you're finally awake, Uzumaki." The old man eyed her with a disdainful expression with hands clasped behind his back as he stood there looking like he owned the world while two of his personal bodyguards stood by his side.

"What do you want with me?" she demanded, tugging at the chains on her wrists as she glared hatefully at the old man.

Onoki chuckled mirthlessly at her. "You know damn well what I want, girl. I will have my revenge, and the Kyuubi will fall into Iwa's hands."

Outwardly, if Kushina was surprised, she didn't show it, but inside her mind, any semblance of order was thrown into disarray. 'How did they find out that I'm the Jinchuriki of the Nine-Tailed Fox?'

"Ahh, that face, you may be wondering how I found out about your status as a Jinchuriki?" The Tsuchikage's gruff voice resonated around the prison cell as he taunted her, his face contorted with so much satisfaction that Kushina felt the irresistible urge to kick him where the sun didn't shine just to wipe the smug expression off his face. But killing him could wait, she needed answers.

She snarled at the old man, feeling the boiling anger in her chest bubble and expand as the Kyuubi's chakra started leaking out of her body. Brute force was her forte; these flimsy chains wouldn't hold her back for a second.

She was proven wrong in less than a second.

Onoki gave her an emotionless stare and flicked his finger once. The shinobi standing beside him formed a tiger seal and whispered 'Fuin' in a flat voice.

The thick chains that kept her bound glowed with a familiar golden shine and she felt the Kyuubi's chakra recede, retreating back deep inside her body. Her stomach dropped, eyes going blank.

She would recognize this seal and comforting glow anywhere; why wouldn't she? It was one of her clan's masterpieces, created from the blood, sweat, and tears of more than a hundred Uzumaki seal masters.

It did not belong here.

Kushina Uzumaki was not an angry person by nature. Sure, there was the occasional scene here and there where people rubbed her the wrong way, but that was inevitable in life. She needed to be able to control her anger in order to avoid unleashing a calamity upon whoever was unfortunate enough to irritate her.

She had only felt two types of anger in her life: one was a temporary, fleeting blubble of anger, easily coming, easy going. It wasn't unlike the kind when someone ate your last cup of ramen.

The other was different. It was an insidious thing, dark and unforgiving. Under normal circumstances, Kushina would never let this off its ironclad leash, but she could clearly feel her control slipping by the second; a testament to how far gone she actually was.

Her thoughts sparked from one to another with the persistence of a bloodhound, the answer becoming clearer as each neuron fired with a rising fervor.

This seal would never fall into Iwa's hands unless…

Her face sobered. The Second Shinobi War then. Konoha never found out specifically who had massacred her homeland, but it was clear after an investigation was conducted in the area at least two major powers had wiped out the remote island nation of Uzushio. They had suspected it was Kiri and Kumo, however, it looked like Iwa also had a hand in destroying her home, in killing her clansmen and beloved family.

Kushina raised her eyes, devilish violet meeting tar black.

"You," she spat out venomously, the single word carrying more hate than she could ever express in any amount of curses.

"Ahh, feisty as ever. Danzo really outdid himself this time."

Kushina's eyes widened.'Why did he...there's only one reason why this damn old man mentioned that old war hawk.'

Danzo Shimura, a traitor?

'But why? Danzo is a militaristic bastard who wants Konoha to always be on top. Why would he give the Kyuubi, one of the reasons why Konoha is considered the strongest Hidden Village, to Iwa? Danzo would never do such a thing, there's no way he would...then why?'

Her mind flitted back to numerous political battles the old war hawk had with Minato then to the conversations she had with a certain elder before she decided to take on this mission.

She had never talked with Danzo much aside from a few mission depriving when the Sandaime was still the Hokage. She had never liked him, however, she knew that Danzo and the other two elders–Homora and Koharu–were on cahoots. Her interaction with the elder, Koharu, a few days ago suddenly made so much sense to her now.

"...you could have commanded honor. But you couldn't even serve the village with the most powerful ninja tool in existence."

She felt her hands and feet grow cold as realization dawned on her.

"But you, the supposed holder of the most powerful Bijuu, enjoyed comfort and security as the Hokage's wife. Is that how you demonstrate your worth, S Class Kunoichi Kushina Uzumaki? Hiding behind your Kage?"

Those snide remarks and other offhanded comments she told her gained new meaning. 'That bitch basically manipulated me to take this damn mission!'

Hindsight was 20/20. Painfully so.

The fact that Danzo and Koharu had been traitors the entire time, and the possibility of there being more like them, pushed Kushina over the edge. And there was only one way in which she could let out all of her raw, aching fury.

Sadness and hurt were only a stone's throw away from similarly cripplingly dark emotions. Despair, anguish, all those manifested in a blood-red chakra, spilling voraciously from her body. The golden chains glowed brighter and brighter as it struggled to keep up with the sheer volume of hatred that bubbled with her chakra, threatening to breach the shining links.

Kushina Uzumaki screamed.

In the following weeks, Kushina was subjected to brutal nonstop torture. The two Iwa Shinobi assigned to interrogate her were ruthless, asking for invaluable information on her husband and Konoha. They took shifts, and never let her rest for a second, but Kushina never once opened her mouth other than to shriek and curse colorfully.

'I am Kushina fucking Uzumaki-Namikaze!'

She would yell this inside her head every time she felt herself falter. It would without fail to reignite her resolve, no matter how far gone she was. She would never go down without a fight or her name wasn't Uzumaki and fight she would.

For a whole month, she was tortured and was barely fed, her body was as weak as a butterfly. The desire to ask for death grew exponentially with every waking minute.

She always thought of Minato as her anchor, her stronghold in the storm, no matter how bad the situation got…her husband who was undoubtedly going insane with worry now. He was the only reason why she was fighting to stay alive. Because one way or another, she would escape this hellhole.

She would come back to Konoha, and when she did, she would make them all pay. Minato would show no mercy on them. She swore on her life that she would not die here.

She would fight for her husband, no matter how much pain she'd have to endure, she would fight to survive. For him.

'I refuse to die!' she yelled in her mind as she panted harshly.

Sweat rolled down her skin as blood oozed from her wounds, but she looked up and stared straight towards her captor and spat at him. She had good aim, proved once again as her spit landed on his face. Bullseye.

Kushina grinned triumphantly. She had done her utmost in the last month to make these two interrogators' lives the absolute worst, passively and actively. Soon, being appointed as her guard had become one of the most disliked positions out there. She would be damned if she let them nap while on duty.

'Serves them right.'

The man screeched in disgust, aggressively punching her face once, twice, yet, her feline grin never left her features. It didn't matter how many injuries were inflicted upon her; she was the Red Hot-Blooded Habanero. A fucking Jinchuriki. They never stayed down for long. Even fatal injuries were not out of the question for such a being's healing abilities. She was a tad thankful to the damn fox during her stay in this hellhole, even though it was the thing that made her a target in the first place.

The Iwa Shinobi who was assigned to torture her was dragged out from her prison cell screaming and kicking her as he threatened to kill her. Kushina cackled humorlessly as she watched the man glare at her with bloodshot eyes, murder in his expression and in his words.

Those jerks thought that they could just punch and kick her without retaliation? If they thought that she would just make it easy for them to torture her, then they were out of their damn minds. She was the wife of the Yellow Flash, the last descendant to the Uzumaki clan and an S-Ranked shinobi; she wasn't just any woman they could trample over.

They dragged her back forcefully and threw her back into the cramped cell, the multiple locks click-clacking shut one by one. Kushina curled up on the floor and couldn't help but smile sadly as she thought of her Minato.

'Minato… ' She missed him so damn much. She missed his kisses, his hugs, his touch. His sunny smile and his sheepish look whenever he would come up with another stupid Jutsu with stupid names.

'Minato… save me, save me please!'

Tears started flowing down her cheeks as the dam broke. She felt her chest twist in agony and longing. It was when she was given a moment to herself that Kushina allowed herself to feel– to feel alone, to feel cold, to feel nearly broken.

'Minato…'

The next time Kushina opened her eyes, she wasn't alone in her cell. Her injuries had not completely healed yet, but she could tell that someone was with her.

"-Shina-!" The person was calling her…who could it be? She pondered this as her mind shook off the numbing blanket called sleep. The only times she could rest were the times when she slept, and she cherished those short hours unburdened with the agony the next day was sure to bring.

She blinked her blurry eyes open a couple of times until she finally adjusted her sight. The first thing she registered was the color—

'Red?' The person was kneeling in front of her.

"Agh... " Kushina tried to speak but her throat felt so raw. That's right…the night before she had gone through yet another "session" before being returned to her cell. It seemed that the longer the time as a prisoner, the more the pain and memories blurred together, time was only an illusion at this point.

"Kushina-neesama!"

Her eyes suddenly snapped open, mournful violet eyes staring back at her. The distinct red hair of the Uzumaki clan stood out from the depressing color of her dark cell, framing a very familiar face that she thought she lost many years ago.

Kushina stared with wide unblinking eyes as she realized that she was gazing at the bruised face of her long-lost sister.

"Kao...ru-chan?" her worn voice rasped hopefully as she stared longingly at the miniature replica of her mother.

"Kushina-neesama!" Kaoru, her youngest sister cried out as tears rolled down her cheeks.

'Kaoru has always been like mother, from her looks to her personality.' Kushina thought as she basked in the comforting feeling of her sister's presence. She closed her eyes as she felt a hot forehead bump into her own, and warmth suddenly surrounded her whole being.

"Kaoru-chan..." she whispered under her breath, voice laced with affection as she was assaulted with nostalgic memories she shared with her sister as a child.

While Kushina inherited her father's boisterous personality, Kaoru was almost exactly like their mother's clone; from her physical appearance to her calm and polite personality and her logical thinking.

Kaori and Kushina would have been taken for twins had the length of their hair and their personalities not served as a way to tell them apart. Kushina tended to grow her hair way past her hips while Kaoru usually maintained her shoulder-length hair. However, because of Kaoru's imprisonment, her hair had grown more than she preferred in the past.

It's been so long…

Kushina's eyes roamed her sister's face, and soon she was weeping from the overwhelming happiness and relief that surged through her heart. It had been a whole month without anybody to talk to aside from her interrogators, and that was more than enough reason for the walls she had built to crumble and shatter.

Her wrists blazed in pain as she strained against the cursed chains hugging her bloodied flesh. Next to her, her sister's hands were bound by a metal chain with similar engravement. So no matter how much they desired to cling to one another, they could not. They came to a silent compromise and buried their faces on the crook of each other's neck, letting their tears flow freely. Neither of them moved for hours that followed as nightfall gradually shrouded the world in darkness.

After the tears had long run dry, Kushina stared at her sister again.

'She looks so thin,' she noted worriedly.

Wiping her tears off with her arm to regain at least a scrap of dignity – which earned a short bark of laughter from Kushina – Kaoru finally started telling her what really happened to her. It turns out that Kaoru had been captured years ago, back when the Uzushiogakure was attacked and decimated by Kiri, Kumo—and secretly, Iwa.

The whole time her sister was talking, Kushina was filled with growing horror and disbelief. She only gave a small, melancholic smile when she was told that the Uzumaki did not go down quietly; every single one of them that had been taken down, the Uzumaki had taken ten enemies from the land of the living.

She couldn't help but shake in restrained fury as she found out that the reason Iwa was keeping her sister prisoner was the need for Uzumaki blood to activate the seals stolen from Uzushio. This entire time they had been using her sister's blood to experiment with their clan's prized possessions.

'Those bastards!' Once she got out of this cell, she would teach them the meaning of the apocalypse, and she could not wait for that time to finally come.

Kushina felt ill. She didn't know why she suddenly couldn't stomach the smell of any food they fed her. She threw up every morning and she was craving ramen more than she ever had. Her arms were no longer suspended in the air, 'a privilege' they claimed to her disgust, but the damned links remained locked tightly around her wrists.

Her sister Kaoru was getting worried. "Nee-sama… I think something is wrong with you." she said softly, rubbing Kushina's back as she threw up the contents of her stomach.

Her reply was another heave as the acidic taste of her vomit caused her stomach to turn. Nausea clawed at her throat, and she tried to force down the bile by attempting to cover her mouth with a shaking hand, but it was too late. Chunks of partially digested scraps spewed out of her mouth, choking and coughing, her stomach's contents went straight into the rusted bucket that the Iwa guards threw inside their cell earlier this morning.

Her stomach kept on contracting violently and forcing everything up and out. Her face was white and clammy, as sweat and tears rolled down her pale skin. She lurched forward and sunk down to the cold floor of their cell; her body too fatigued to keep herself upright anymore. The pungent stench invaded her nostrils and she heaved again, even though there was nothing left to throw up. Her throat hurt from all the vomiting she'd been doing since the day before, and her head was killing her. Kushina wondered if this was another atrocious method of torture those Iwa ninjas had for her.

Her eyes were getting blurry again. Slowly, darkness spread all over her, and the next second, unconsciousness gently took her from reality. It felt like both a second and eternity had passed when she came to and someone appeared to be tending to her; however, her mind was still murky and unclear from the sleep she'd had.

Kushina felt something prick the skin of her arm, and the haziness vanished in an instant, but to her surprise when she darted her eyes upward, she saw a woman in white garments passing the needle to a similarly dressed man. Doctors or something similar, she recognized idly.

"So, what's wrong with her?" She heard the irate voice of the Tsuchikage.

'That damn Onoki, so they didn't want me dead yet,' Kushina bitterly thought, knowing full well that they needed her alive to steal the Kyuubi from her, but the question is, how the hell were they going to accomplish that?

She was here for almost two months already and they did nothing but interrogate her for information which they have not gotten yet. There could not be anything that she could give–

"She's three months pregnant."

Kushina's world began spinning when she heard what the medic had said.

'Pregnant...pregnant...three months pregnant...' was all she could think about before her mind drifted back into unconsciousness, her last thoughts both tinged with elation and soul-crushing despair.

For weeks, he'd been searching for a suitable Jinchuriki candidate but it looks like only a child with Uzumaki blood could handle the potent chakra of the Kyuubi. Onoki couldn't just carelessly choose a nameless child to house the bijuu or his village would turn into smithereens. As he racked his brain for a solution, the answer came to him itself like a gift from kami.

"She's three months pregnant."

Onoki grinned maliciously when he heard the news, and laughed. "Finally, what a stroke of luck! We will have a new Jinchuriki in six months!"

"Can we get rid of the mother once she gives birth?" one of his shinobi murmured beside him.

Onoki crossed his arms and scoffed. "No. As much as I want to get rid of the yellow flash' wife, we still need her alive to defeat Namikaze."

The shinobi immediately nodded and took a step back behind him.

"Make sure this woman gives birth safely. Keep her healthy and alive so the Jinchuriki will be healthy and strong too. Feed her properly for the following six months, make sure that she will give birth to that Uzumaki child without complication. After she has given birth, we will start the transferring of the Bijuu." Onoki ordered, all the other present ninjas immediately went to carry out his orders.

"Understood, Tsuchikage-sama!" one of his guards answered as he bowed.

Onoki smirked and looked down at the glaring woman before he left the prison.

*END OF CHAPTER THREE*

DON'T FORGET TO LEAVE YOUR REVIEWS

I only accept CONSTRUCTIVE CRITICISM, If you hate my story, please just stop reading it. This is my first Naruto fanfic, and I love Naruto. I don't want to leave the fandom because of many toxic fans so those who love it, enjoy reading.

SyrinxSilenus